


Sleep to Heal

by Astrarian



Series: Writer's Month, August 2020 [9]
Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Season 1, Sharing a Bed, Writer's Month 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:15:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25811929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Astrarian/pseuds/Astrarian
Summary: “Wha’s hap’nin’?” comes Bow’s unsteady voice out of the darkness behind Adora.“I think Adora’s sick,” Glimmer answers. “I think she’s got a fever.”(Writer's month 2020 - Day 9: illness)
Relationships: Adora & Bow & Glimmer (She-Ra)
Series: Writer's Month, August 2020 [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1861909
Kudos: 49
Collections: Writer's Month 2020





	Sleep to Heal

Glimmer fights it, but her body drags her towards wakefulness regardless. She groans, opening sore eyes slowly. She wants to be asleep. She should be asleep.

But she’s too hot. Much too hot. Someone is pressed against her back, their knees jammed in the space behind Glimmer’s, arm curled around her stomach. From the shape of the body against her own, Glimmer realises it’s Adora. Definitely.

It would feel pretty nice if it wasn’t so warm, and if she wasn’t pressing quite so hard against her wing buds.

It also doesn’t quite make sense. It’s not like Adora to be clingy. More than that, it’s not like her to stay still as she sleeps. Adora flails about all night, every night. Bow and Glimmer used to joke that Adora was fighting in her dreams, until Adora admitted she literally was. She wouldn’t talk about it in detail, drooping in a way that Glimmer and Bow hated, so they stopped mentioning it. But that wasn’t enough, with Adora resolutely unable to fall asleep until they reassured her by sharing the bed with her instead. They’re all mature enough to share the space, and they haven’t stopped since—beds are always comfier than the floor.

Glimmer would like to think that Adora feels safer these days. She’d like to think that Adora learning to chill out during the day is beginning to sink in at night as well. It’s a nice thought. She wants that for Adora. And for herself and Bow, since Adora’s thrashing elbows and knees leave them with bruises sometimes.

Nice as the idea is—nice as it is to realise that they’re cuddling without it being because Adora’s woken Glimmer up through a punch in the shoulder—Glimmer doesn’t think it’s true. Not enough time has passed to break the habit of a lifetime, though she doesn’t know how much time Adora needs.

All of this flits through Glimmer’s mind over a few seconds. At the same time, she also tries to argue that the snuggling isn’t too warm, that moving isn’t actually justified.

Unfortunately, her body insists that it is. 

Glimmer grabs Adora’s arm, shifting it off herself. As she does she takes note of how warm Adora’s bare skin feels to the touch. She rolls away from Adora into open, cool space, and is instantly relieved by the reduced temperature. She also opens and closes her hand, absently confirming that although she herself is too warm, she isn’t the source of the heat.

Swallowing the taste of cardboard in her mouth, Glimmer props herself up on an elbow to look at Adora. It’s near impossible to see her in the dark, though, so Glimmer leans closer, pressing the back of her hand against Adora’s forehead.

Adora’s skin is hot and sweaty. She begins to tremble. She stirs, her forehead furrowing under Glimmer’s touch.

“Hey, Adora?” Glimmer whispers, growing more alert by the second. 

Adora shifts again and whines, a sad, seeking sound that Glimmer dislikes instantly. Her hand pushes out into the space where Glimmer had been a minute before, then retreats.

“Wha’s hap’nin’?” comes Bow’s unsteady voice out of the darkness behind Adora.

“I think Adora’s sick,” Glimmer answers. “I think she’s got a fever.”

Adora curls in on herself, her trembling turning to full shivering.

“Can She-Ra even get sick?” Bow asks. He sits up, a grey shadow in an ocean of grey shadows.

“Obviously she can,” Glimmer says, peevish at the question being asked just right this second when that ship has clearly already sailed. “Feel for yourself,” she invites, running through the previous evening in her head.

“She didn’t seem sick earlier,” Bow says, more thoughtful than accusing, likely working through the same mental information as he touches Adora’s forehead gently.

“Yeah. She did get tired before us, though.”

“Does that mean anything?”

“Maybe it does if you’re She-Ra?”

They’re interrupted by Adora herself. “Catra?”

Though she mumbles, the name is clear.

Glimmer freezes for a moment. She can’t tell if Adora’s really awake. Adora rarely talks about Catra as anything other than a Force Captain, even though Glimmer and Bow know they were close. She wishes she could see Bow’s expression, but they’re still mostly shrouded from each other.

“No, it’s us,” she says, leaning down. “Glimmer and Bow. At Bright Moon,” she adds hesitantly.

Adora shifts again, this time much more deliberately. “Glimmer?” she asks groggily, properly awake by now.

“Hey, yeah,” Glimmer answers. “You okay? How are you feeling? You seem feverish.”

“Cold,” Adora groans.

“We think you’re sick,” Bow says, tucking the covers more closely around her and then throwing his own blanket over her as well. Glimmer fiddles with a nearby lamp until a soft light diffuses through the room.

“‘m fine,” Adora says. Her teeth begin to chatter. “Just n-need some sleep. Jus’ a bit m-more.”

“Well, yeah, of course,” Bow says, sounding confused. Glimmer shares that confusion. “You don’t need to go anywhere if you’re sick,” he adds.

“Not sick,” Adora mutters. “I’ll be r-ready.”

“Ready?” Bow mouths at Glimmer, and she shakes her head, equally perplexed. It must be yet another awful thing Adora learned from the Horde. Not wanting people to get better when sick would fit with their ethos of being terrible, after all.

“You don’t need to get ready for anything,” Glimmer says, touching Adora’s forehead again. “You don’t have to be anywhere except right here. Not ‘til you recover.”

Adore doesn’t say anything, her teeth still chattering, but she opens her eyes, and she looks so unsure when she peers up at Glimmer that Glimmer’s hate for the Horde digs itself even deeper on the spot.

Glimmer strokes her hand across Adora’s forehead and over her hair, then repeats the motion, hoping that the action comforts Adora the way that it always comforted Glimmer when she was sick as a kid. The more she dwells on it the more she suspects Adora’s never had that.

Bow squeezes Adora’s hip and then climbs off the bed. “I’m gonna get you some water. Rest and lots of fluids is the key to fighting a fever.”

“Don’ n-need to,” Adora mutters.

“I can go, it’ll be faster,” Glimmer offers, ignoring Adora.

“No, it’s all right.” Bow smiles at her. “Back in a minute.”

“I’m fine,” Adora says. She tries to sound insistent, but she’s so obviously off her game that Glimmer just purses her lips fondly and strokes Adora’s head again.

“You’re welcome to tell me all about how fine you are once you actually are,” she says, “but we’re not doing this right now. Go to sleep. I’m sorry we woke you up in the first place.”

“N-no one ever took care of us,” Adora says, tone heavy.

Glimmer thinks about prying a little further. She wants to: Adora might just open up, and Bow’s always saying that talking about stuff helps, and Glimmer just wants to know.

“You and Catra?” she asks carefully.

Adora nods once, sad, and somehow small in the bed even though she’s so strong.

Glimmer changes her mind. “You aren’t with the Horde any more,” she says, instead of asking anything further. “We’ll look after you, okay? That’s not an offer, by the way. That’s a fact.” She adjusts the blanket over Adora.

“Th-thank you,” Adora whispers.

Glimmer smiles at her. She strokes her hair until long after Bow’s returned and Adora’s fallen asleep again.

“You okay?” Bow whispers, glancing at her hand.

“Just thinking,” Glimmer whispers back.

“Okay,” he answers, and he holds her hand over Adora’s head. “Here if you need me.”

She nods. “I know. I just want Adora to know that, too.”

“She will, one day.”

Glimmer trusts him absolutely. “We’ll just have to keep showing her,” she agrees.

Bow nods as well and squeezes her hand.


End file.
